In 2017, we left Osaka (大阪) early in the morning for a one-hour train ride to Nara (奈良). We had only one day left before taking the plane home from Tokyo the next day.
Our intent was to take a stroll through the city and visit the eponymous park bordered by temples, shrines and ruins.
Indeed, Nara, an ancient capital of Japan during the 8th Century, is known for its eight temples and other religious buildings ; 29 of them registered as National Treasures!
As such, we were expecting the park to be crowded. In retrospect, for a Saturday, it was not so bad. Yes we saw dozens of buses pouring tourists one after the other, and it was noisy, but it seemed like most of them just wanted to see the Tōdai-ji (more on that later). However, if you are planning to visit different cities during your trip to Japan, maybe think about choosing a weekday to visit Nara, or/and try to get there early in the morning.
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We chose to take the Kintetsu Line from Osaka, because it stopped at the Kintetsu-Nara Station, ideally placed just 150 meters away from the Kōfuku-ji, one of the aforementioned eight temples, and itself a stone throw's from the Nara Park.
A few meters before the temple, we received a warming welcome from the other Nara inhabitants: deer!
Contrary to Miyajima's, Nara's deer have trained themselves, through generations, to bow to humans to get food. It's also pretty cool to see them roaming around freely in and around the park minding their own business, comfortable among humans. There is a form of mutual respect as deer are regarded as messengers of the gods in the Shinto religion.
After that greeting, we returned back to the path leading to the Kōfuku-ji, a Buddhist Temple comprised of various buildings, among them two pagodas, one a five-story and the other a three-story.
We knew there was still much to be seen and our time was limited, so we continued straight east, towards the Nara National Museum. We briefly sat for a quick drink on a bench next to a small pond on the eastern side of the museum, observing people giving food to deer and taking pictures with them.
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We got back on the track and finally entered Nara Park. Our eyes were immediately attracted south to a big (really big) tree, more than thousand-year old:
Also, I managed to take a picture without anyone, but I prefere this one with some humans for scale!
If you are a Totoro fan, you must have already recognized it as a camphor tree, where the totoro spirits dwell. We did not see any, but they only show up at their own pleasure, right ?!
After that unexpected encounter we returned to the path leading east, towards the shrines and temples. It was like progressively entering a forest with more and more trees and deer. But as we were getting closer to the Kasuga-taisha shrine (春日大社), we started to see more and more stone lanterns on both sides of the road!
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The Kasuga-taisha shrine has been established in 768 CE and rebuilt several times over the centuries. It is the shrine of the Fujiwara clan, a powerful family of regents. The interior is famous for its many stone and bronze lanterns of which I think I managed to take cool pics (I already shared that second picture on steemit, I just love it)
We left the temple by the western exit, and clearly took an unusual path that goes north-east. After a few hundred meters it felt wrong because we had to walk on the edge of a road where cars are allowed, but it was only for a few minutes and we saw none anyway. Instead of entering the alley bordered by stores that leads to a pack of temples and shrines, we entered by the back and saw cherry trees, and a wedding photo-shoot!
Finally, continuing ahead north, we arrived at a place surrounded by dozens of religious buildings. One of them is the Nigatsu-do (二月堂). It is part of the Todai-ji (東大寺) temple complex and offers a panoramic view of Nara as well as a sneak peek at the main edifice. The weather was a bit cloudy, but just imagine how more impressive the view could be if you could see all Nara (and more) in front of you.
After a short break, we pursued on a narrow path circulating between other buildings of the complex. After a few hundred meters, we finally arrived at the front of the Daibutsuden (大仏殿 ), the Great Buddha Hall.
It's big! Actually, until 1998, it was the biggest wooden building in the world. While it does not hold this record anymore, it has another notable trait, one you cannot see until you gaze inside: the world's largest bronze Buddha Vairocana. No wonder (pun intended) the temple is both a listed UNESCO World Heritage Site and a National Treasure of Japan.
Also, as I 've said earlier, this is the place where you'll encounter the most people. It's similarly crowded as Asakusa's Sensō-ji in Tokyo, if you've been there.
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We finished on a high note, but unfortunately, it was time to get back... It felt like we barely touched the surface of what Nara had to offer. But we needed to walk to the JR Nara station to take the train on the Yamatoji Line as it was taking us closer to our destination in Osaka.
Before that though, we stopped at a coffee in Higashimuki's shopping arcade, close to the Kintetsu station. If you have a few minutes before your train, this is a great place with a healthy choice of restaurants and coffee places.
Here is our trip:
It's only 7.5km (6.2km plus 1.3km to the JR station), and we certainly did not see everything but we did not rush either. Usually, we can achieve close to 12km to 15km a day, but with a trolley and a baby, we had to pause from time to time as good parents do to feed their child, taking (a lot of) pictures and of course change diapers! 😉
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The story and the pictures are all by me with the exception of the photo of Buddha Vairocana credited to kanpai.fr. Please upvote, comment, resteem as much as you want, I'd certainly appreciate positive/negative critic as I want to get better at sharing good travel memories, moreover when it's about Japan 🇯🇵!
Thank you very much for reading this!
終わり / The end!